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Table of Contents
See also: Transportation | Electric Bikes
Articles
The great bicycle boom of 2020
Throughout lockdown, rusty bikes were dusted off in garages around the world and sales of new bikes surged. The question is now: can it last?
By Adrienne Bernhard
Covid-19 brought about a dramatic increase in bicycle sales in response to the pandemic. Heightened anxiety over public transportation and a surge in exercise has meant that more and more are choosing to use one of the most basic forms of mobility, leading to a so-called “bike boom”.
The phenomenon has been well-documented: suppliers have struggled to keep up with demand; cities have redesigned their streets to accommodate an influx of riders; manufacturers are trying to forecast the longevity of the bike’s newfound popularity; economists are considering whether e-bikes’ rising popularity will enable more commuters to get to work. An industry that was already thriving before the pandemic has suddenly accelerated. But what will that mean for the future of bicycles?
https://www.bbc.com/future/bespoke/made-on-earth/the-great-bicycle-boom-of-2020.html
The curious case of the handlebar bag scam
by Iain Treloar - February 26, 2021
When Route Werks launched its debut product in October 2020, there was plenty of reason for optimism. Cycling was booming. Handlebar bags were popping up on bikes of all flavours. In the pandemic, there was opportunity.
The small Rhode Island team had spent a couple of years developing a handlebar bag – a clever design that overcame most of the compromises of other brands – and unveiled it on Kickstarter.
Within just six hours, it had hit its funding goal. By the end of the crowdfunding campaign, 1,850 people had pledged a total of roughly US$315,000.
https://cyclingtips.com/2021/02/route-werks-handlebar-bag-scam/
Smart’s airless metal tires are designed for Mars and your bike
Caley Fretz - March 17, 2021
The Smart METL uses a “shape memory alloy” to allow deformation like a pneumatic tire
It will take something special to unseat rubber and air from their perch atop the tire hierarchy.
A company founded by a “Survivor:Fiji” winner and built on technology originally developed for NASA’s various space rovers is the latest to give it a go. The Smart METL tires are, as the name suggests, made of metal, specifically, a nickel-titanium alloy called NiTinol+ arranged in a series of interconnected loops or springs that looks a bit like medieval chainmail.
The material itself is the key innovation. It’s a “shape memory alloy” created by NASA engineers Dr. Santo Padula and Colin Creager and is capable of deforming and returning to shape without losing structural integrity. The material and design were developed for to NASA’s Mars rovers, which need to function on a planet too cold for rubber tires.
https://cyclingtips.com/2021/03/smart-metl-airless-metal-tires-are-designed-for-mars-and-your-bike/
Cycling is ten times more important than electric cars for reaching net-zero cities
March 29, 2021 10.59am EDT — Christian Brand
Globally, only one in 50 new cars were fully electric in 2020, and one in 14 in the UK. Sounds impressive, but even if all new cars were electric now, it would still take 15-20 years to replace the world’s fossil fuel car fleet.
The emission savings from replacing all those internal combustion engines with zero-carbon alternatives will not feed in fast enough to make the necessary difference in the time we can spare: the next five years. Tackling the climate and air pollution crises requires curbing all motorised transport, particularly private cars, as quickly as possible. Focusing solely on electric vehicles is slowing down the race to zero emissions.
This is partly because electric cars aren’t truly zero-carbon – mining the raw materials for their batteries, manufacturing them and generating the electricity they run on produces emissions.
I was knocked off my bike by a driver… and faced more than just a physical battle
by Emma Silversides - Sun, Apr 11, 2021 11:00
On top of the physical and emotional stress that came with being knocked off her bike, in this blog road.cc contributor Emma Silversides recounts another frustrating hurdle that she was forced to climb over following the incident last year. Here’s what happened when she tried to insure a new car…
“While out on the bike in November last year, I was hit by a driver while going round a roundabout. The driver literally drove into my left side, and afterwards he stopped, as did the woman behind him.
He started to claim I wasn't visible, as the incident happened at night. The female driver who had been behind him as he came onto the roundabout was swift to support me: “How did you not see her? She is glowing, even I saw her and I was behind you”, she said.
Indeed, I had two front and two rear lights and fully reflective Proviz gear on. The driver quickly relented and handed over details. I was in shock but could move, which I figured was just bruising at first as nothing felt broken at the time.
The following morning, when I went to stand up, my knee gave way. I went to the hospital, and the incident was reported to the police. The driver admitted fault and was sent on a driver's awareness course.
https://road.cc/content/blog/knocked-my-bike-now-im-being-penalised-it-282421
Locate your stolen bike with DIY GPS
Thomas Andreatta - May 29, 2021
Bicycle theft is, unfortunately, a very common problem. Most bicycle locks are easy to overcome, which makes bike theft a crime of opportunity. Recovering a stolen one is usually improbable, but this DIY GPS tracker could provide the help that you need.
The GPS tracker, designed by Johan, is like Lojack for your bicycle. If the device detects that the bike has moved, it will send a text message and start tracking the GPS location. It will periodically send an update with the current location, so you can track down your stolen bike (with the help of the police).
https://www.open-electronics.org/locate-your-stolen-bike-with-diy-gps/
How cyclists respond to bad weather: Lessons learnt from 100 million rides
Data taken from 40 bike share schemes around the world paints an interesting picture of our willingness to brave the elements.
by Matt de Neef - October 28, 2021
For most cyclists, it’s part of their pre-ride routine – a quick check of a weather app to see what they’re in for and whether they should even be riding at all. Raining? That ride might be a little less appealing. Scorching hot? Likely the same.
Of course, the weather itself varies considerably depending on where you are in the world and the time of year. And everyone’s different in how they handle adverse weather conditions. But are there generalisations we can make about how cyclists in different regions handle bad weather?
Are people from wetter climates more likely to ride when it’s wet? Are people who live in hotter climes less likely to be scared off the bike by hot weather? And more generally, what impact does the weather have on the number of people riding bikes?
This New ‘Theft-Proof’ Bike’s Whole Frame Turns Into a Lock
Its tires also come equipped with thick reflective strips so that others see your bike at night.
Bryan Hood - February 24, 2022
Yerka Bikes wants to make sure you never have to deal with the crushing disappointment of having your bicycle stolen ever again.
The company has just unveiled the third-generation of its theft-proof bicycle. We can understand your skepticism at such bold claim, but it’s hard to steal a bike when the two-wheeler itself is the lock.
A sad fact of living in a city is that bikes get stolen. One is stolen every four minutes in Europe, according to the brand. Sometimes a lock isn’t enough, either. There are few things more frustrating than walking to where your bicycle should be only to find that the chain or U-lock you used to secure it has been sawed through. Doing that to the Yerka V3 means sawing right through the bike’s frame, rendering it, in effect, useless.
https://robbreport.com/motors/motorcycles/yerka-v3-theft-proof-bike-integrated-lock-1234665378/
Laser-Projected GPS Directions Should Be a Standard Feature on Every Bicycle
Trying to ride a bike, keep eyes on the road, and look at a phone for directions is too much to ask of a cyclist.
Andrew Liszewski - 7 March 2022 11:07AM
Although Apple didn’t call out bikes specifically when it recommended iPhone users not mount their iPhones to motorcycles and scooters, anyone who’s ever tried to attach a smartphone to a bicycle’s handlebars knows it can be just as risky. But of all the other ways there are to get GPS directions while out for a ride, having a big directional arrow projected on the road ahead of you is, hands down, the coolest.
Although most commonly used for pointing at things and intergalactic space warfare, there are actually some clever ways lasers can be used with bicycles. A decade ago companies were integrating them into bike taillights to project virtual lane markers on the road around a cyclist to create a virtual safe space that drivers and other cyclists will subconsciously stay clear of. We’ve even seen laser projectors added to bike headlights to project a highly visible warning on the road about 20 feet in front of riders so that pedestrians and cars will see them coming before they see the actual bicycle.
https://gizmodo.com/every-bike-should-come-with-lasercube-projected-gps-dir-1848616436
Bicycles Have Evolved. Have We?
From the velocipede to the ten-speed, biking innovations brought riders freedom. But in a world built for cars, life behind handlebars is both charmed and dangerous.
Jill Lepore - May 23, 2022
My first bicycle was not, in fact, a bicycle. I rode it in 1968, when I was two years old and as tubby as a bear cub. It had four wheels, not two, and no pedals: strictly speaking, it was a scooter. But Playskool called it a Tyke Bike, so I say it qualifies, and aside from the matte-black, aluminum-alloy number that I’ve got now, which is called (by the manufacturer dead seriously, and by me aspirationally) the Bad Boy, the Tyke Bike may be the swankiest bicycle I’ve ever ridden. According to the box, Playskool’s scooter—red and blue and white, with a yellow, leopard-spotted wooden seat, chrome handlebars, and black, white-walled wheels—offered “smart high style” for the “preschool jet set,” as if a little girl in a diaper and a romper were about to scoot along the jetway to board a T.W.A. flight bound for Zurich.
Bicycle graveyards: why do so many bikes end up underwater?
Every year, thousands of bikes are tossed into rivers, ponds, lakes and canals. What’s behind this mass drowning?
Jody Rosen - Thu 28 Jul 2022 01.00 EDT
Every decade or so, the city of Paris drains the Canal Saint-Martin. The nearly three-mile-long waterway, which runs south across a swathe of the Right Bank, was originally constructed to keep Paris clean, supplying fresh water to a city plagued by cholera and dysentery. But for the two centuries of the canal’s existence, it has often served a different – in fact, opposite – function. It is a dumping ground, a big liquid trash can. The periodic draining is therefore also an unveiling. The water recedes, and the stuff kicked or heaved or furtively dropped into the canal over the preceding few thousand nights is revealed.
When the canal was emptied in 2016, crowds gathered on footbridges and along the quais to watch cleaning crews trudge through the mud and clear out the junk. There was lots of it. Mattresses, suitcases, street signs, traffic cones. A washer-dryer, a tailor’s mannequin, tables and chairs, baths, toilets, old radios, personal computers. A number of vehicles, none of them designed to travel on water, were pulled from the mire. There were baby strollers, shopping carts, at least one wheelchair and several mopeds.
Bikes, Not Self Driving Cars, Are The Technological Gateway To Urban Progress
Op-Ed: Bicycles can be at the core of the technological revolution our cities need. It might just require us to use a different lens.
Nicolas Collignon - September 9, 2022
t took a whole lot of noise from activists and campaigners for bicycles to be taken seriously at last year’s COP26 summit in Glasgow, and for active travel to be added to the declaration on accelerating the decarbonisation of road transport.
Beyond the serious lobbying from automotive industries, there seems to be a psychological block that prevents the bicycle from being accepted as a central technology when imagining the future of cities.
Sometimes money speaks the loudest. Since 2010, over $200 billion have been invested in autonomous vehicle (AV) technology. Over a similar period of time, just slightly over $2 billion were spent on bike and pedestrian initiatives in the European Union.
Bike frame stiffness: Why it matters and all you need to know
Lighter, more aero, stiffer… but how does bike frame stiffness actually affect your ride? And is more always better?
Paddy Maddison - 19 Dec 2022
When it comes to cycling performance, stiffer means better. Or at least that’s what the bike industry marketeers would have us believe. They may have a point, although just what the word ‘stiffness’ means in bicycle engineering is somewhat more complex than a simple ‘more is better’.
Along with weight and aerodynamics, stiffness is one of the engines that drives modern composite bike design. But while a number on the scales and the way a frame cuts through the air are relatively easy concepts to wrap one’s head around, stiffness is much more difficult to quantify.
Can it be put into numbers? Sure. There are all sorts of complex jigs that manufacturers use to measure stiffness, but for the average cyclist it’s less about exact figures and more about feel. Broken down to its absolute fundamentals, stiffness is the opposite of compliance, which is a mark of how prone a frame is to bending in certain planes.
https://www.cyclist.co.uk/in-depth/11046/bike-frame-stiffness
Biggest Barrier to Biking Is the Fear of Cars
A study confirms that if we are serious about getting people on bikes, they need a safe place to ride.
Lloyd Alter - January 4, 2023 09:12AM EST
It is a mantra on Treehugger that three things are needed for a bike and e-bike revolution: good affordable bikes, safe places to ride, and secure places to park. But all three things are not of equal weight. A new study, “Barriers and enablers of bike riding for transport and recreational purposes in Australia,” based on surveys in Melbourne, finds that the fear of being squished by a car far outweighs any other consideration.
One would think that Melbourne would be bicycle heaven, with its relatively flat topography and moderate climate. Yet overall, only 1.7% of trips are made by bike.
https://www.treehugger.com/fear-of-cars-biggest-biking-barrier-study-6979522
How The Netherlands Built a Biking Utopia
In the 60s and 70s the Dutch government was building car-centered cities. Here's how and why they pivoted.
Michael Thomas - Mar 8, 2023
The Netherlands used to have as much traffic as America
Today the Netherlands is known for having some of the best biking infrastructure in the world. Its cities, like Amsterdam, The Hague, and Utrecht, are often praised for their sustainable city planning and design.
As a result, The Netherlands has far fewer transportation emissions, obesity rates, and traffic fatalities than the United States. (More on all this below).
https://www.distilled.earth/p/how-the-netherlands-built-a-biking
New Study Suggests Cyclists are Better People than Drivers
The Journal for Environmental Psychology says that riders are more interested in the common good than drivers.
Updated Nov 2, 2023 - Alvin Holbrook
Orientation towards the common good in cities: The role of individual urban mobility behavior
Are cyclists better people than drivers? A recent study published in the Journal for Environmental Psychology found that people who navigated cities by cycle were more interested in the common good than drivers. “Duh,” you’re probably saying to yourself.
The study looked at a pool’s orientation toward the common good by looking at four key indicators: political participation, social participation in organizations, neighborhood solidarity, and neighborly helpfulness. Their data showed that the predominant throughline was that these folks were more likely to participate in active transportation (walking, cycling). This news isn’t necessarily new, as previous studies showed how proper urban street design can increase community engagement. But it does reinforce things we already know.
Applications
The 4 Best Apps to Navigate Mountain Biking Trails and Avoid Getting Lost
Mountain biking is an exciting workout and fun way to explore the outdoors. Use these apps to keep your bearings.
Sean Mitchell - 3 November 2022
Tires pumped to perfection? Check. Water bottle filled? Check. Snacks stashed? Check. Now, the only question left is: where to ride?
Maybe you've just gotten into mountain biking and can't wait to shred the local trails. Maybe you're a seasoned rider exploring new territory. Or maybe you've ridden your local bike park or the same trails long enough and you're ready to explore new areas.
Mountain biking is demanding enough without the addition of confusing trail systems. Trails scattered across the sides of a mountain can more closely resemble a tangle of spaghetti. Thankfully, technology makes it easier than ever to ensure you find the trails that are best suited to you.
https://www.makeuseof.com/best-apps-navigate-mountain-biking-trails-avoid-getting-lost/
5 Best Online Communities for Mountain Bikers to Connect and Ride
Connect with other mountain bikers, learn more about the sport, and find new trails and events with these online communities.
Sean Mitchell - 5 January 2023
Mountain biking can be a solo or a social endeavor. While some solid me-time is never a bad thing, the advantage of connecting with other mountain bikers is that you'll have a larger network of folks that can appreciate your trials and victories, share stories, and perhaps answer any questions you might have about riding technique, gear, or places to ride.
Here are 5 online communities that’ll help you connect with others who eat, breathe, and live to mountain bike, just like you!
https://www.makeuseof.com/moutain-bikers-best-online-communities/
Bike Lanes
A Small War Over Bike Lanes May Be an Uber and Lyft Conspiracy
Enraged car owners, suddenly robbed of free parking, want to know why a New York City bike lane advocacy group is accepting funds from Uber and Lyft.
Whitney Kimball - 5 October 2021 3:30PM
If you live in New York City, you are a pedestrian or you are a driver, and you’re enmeshed in a war over streets that hits everyone’s wallets and time. Now, an extraordinary alliance has emerged: a militant local bike lane group, backed by Uber and Lyft, is battling car owners over hundreds of free parking spots. Some suspect a massive conspiracy by rideshare companies to scoop up the streets for themselves. They may be onto something.
Flyers are up; Nextdoor.com is on fire; a petition now has over 1,000 signatures.
Bear with me for a detour into the parking situation: The turf is a desolate parking lot under the Brooklyn Queens Expressway where a bike lane and walkway will cut out a precious 680 free parking spaces. The city plans to meter the remaining 400 spots at an outrageous $1.50/hour, enforced for an unusually long stretch of 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., Monday through Saturday.
As-is, the lot’s more of a conveniently overlooked stretch than a lot; the fumy belt between highway exits is a rare undeveloped patch of pavement with faint paint lines, roadkill Dunkin cups, and smashed tail lights under a thundering structure. As the community board has noted numerous times, it could use some plants.
https://gizmodo.com/a-small-war-over-bike-lanes-may-be-an-uber-and-lyft-con-1847795365
Edge Lane Roads
AKA Advisory Bike Lanes
A website providing information on an exciting new roadway configuration
Do bike lanes lead to more cyclists?
Investigating the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis.
Written by Cenk - June 23, 2022
A new paper published in the journal “Transportation Research Interdisciplinary Perspectives” by Billy Fields, Angie L. Cradock, Jessica L. Barrett, Tony Hull, and Steven J. Melly investigated the effects of bike lanes in Minneapolis.
Minneapolis built 76 miles of bike lanes — of all kinds — from 2007 to 2013.
Subsequent biking increases:
⬆️ 69% on protected bike lanes ⬆️ 26% on on-street bike lanes ⬆️ 10% on streets without bike lanes
This research adds to the growing body of scholarship examining the impact of bicycle facilities on use and provides important evidence supporting strategies to increasing physically active transportation in communities through targeted investments in key infrastructure through pilot programs. They found that improvements in bicycle facilities and the facility density of bicycle infrastructure around those locations are significantly associated with the number of bicyclists and an increased rate of bicycling over time.
Emergency Vehicles
Bike lanes and narrowed streets don’t slow emergency vehicles
People love to complain about traffic calming, but it makes roads safer.
Jonathan M. Gitlin - 7/29/2024, 1:20 PM
Although driving is a privilege, some Americans treat it more like a right. This entitlement leads them to get upset with policy proposals that try to increase road safety by prioritizing vulnerable road users over the wants of drivers. But a new study suggests that a common complaint—taking away lanes from cars makes emergency response times go up—about traffic calming isn't actually true.
American roads aren't particularly safe, and while much of the blame of late has been directed at ever-bigger trucks and SUVs, the problem is more complex than just big cars. Like the built environment, standard American road design, with a pair of lanes going in either direction, makes it very easy to drive much faster than the speed limit, which is often over 25 mph.
This is where road diets come in—they're a relatively cheap and simple way to slow traffic and significantly cut the accident rate along a stretch of road. You take a four-lane (two-way road) and repaint it so there are now three lanes for cars: one in each direction, with a center lane in the middle for turning. The remaining space on either side becomes bike lanes (physically protected ones, please).
The study, conducted by a group of researchers at the University of Iowa led by Nicole Corcoran (now at Arizona State University) and published in Transportation Research Interdisciplinary Perspectives, sought to do a couple of things: First, survey emergency responders to find out how they feel about road diets, and secondly actually quantify the effect of road diets on EMS response time.
Cargo Bike
Welcome to the age of the cargo bike
It’s here, you just haven’t realized it yet.
Daniel Cooper - October 7, 2022 9:00 AM
As the need for cleaner, more sustainable transport becomes ever more urgent, I’ve noticed a familiar pattern in conversations on the topic. Someone will point out that bikes are a lot more efficient and environmentally friendly, reduce congestion and are often faster than cars in cities. Others respond saying that bikes can’t possibly replace cars for a multitude of reasons: Riding on roads is dangerous, it requires a fit body, it makes you get all sweaty, it’s not ideal for trips into the office and bikes can’t protect you from the rain. The other objection is that a standard bike can only carry one person, making it useless for the times when you need to carry multiple people, or lots of stuff. Bikes can’t be used to ferry kids on the school run or haul a week’s worth of groceries, and so it’s pointless to look at them.
Except, of course, bikes have always been able to do those things, sometimes more efficiently than a car, SUV or truck. Cargo bikes offer the capacity to carry multiple people at once and / or haul sizable loads of stuff with very little trouble. It’s this form of cycling that may provide the easiest win for both individuals and cities to help solve the climate crisis. The argument that you need to be physically fit to ride – if that’s even true – doesn’t really apply any more given the benefit of electrification. It means that modern cargo bikes can rid dense city streets of delivery vans cluttering up our roads, and SUVs doing little more than the school run. And this isn’t a dispatch from some far-flung utopia, but something that might become massively popular as a looming fuel crisis causes the price of fuel to skyrocket.
https://www.engadget.com/cargo-cycling-climate-change-emissions-babboe-130049736.html?src=rss
City / State / Country Info
How to Bike Across the Country
Ben Brooks - (Viewed 14 April 2025)
I spent 51 straight days on my bicycle last year, traveling 3,900 miles through high desert, mountain passes, endless prairies, and rolling hills from San Francisco, California to the eastern coast of Virginia. I did the majority of the route (Sacramento to Virginia) solo. Yet I didn’t even own a bike until two weeks before the trip. How'd that happen?
After shutting down my startup in summer 2024, I was burned out and unsure what to do next. Accordingly, I sat down to brainstorm a few crazy ideas in hopes of tackling a meaningful challenge and taking time to clear my head. I considered, but ultimately ruled out due to skill/weather issues, ideas to sail across an ocean or hike the Appalachian or Pacific Crest trails. Bicycling across the continent seemed like the perfect blend of crazy and possible.
https://www.brooks.team/posts/how-to-bike-across-the-country/
France, Paris
Paris Closed 100 Streets to Cars for Good. Now, the City Is a Cyclists’ Paradise.
Turns out when you banish cars for bikes, it’s a blueprint for urban bliss.
Micah Ling - Feb 06, 2024 9:14 AM EST
All eyes are on Paris as we inch closer to this summer’s Olympic Games, but the city is also in the spotlight because of what they’ve recently put into place in terms of infrastructure and transportation. Paris now has more than 100 city streets that are closed to motorized vehicles year-round, and the effect it’s had on the capital city has been profound.
Most recently, the city voted to triple parking charges for the biggest, most polluting cars. According to CNN, Parisians voted Sunday to make it very, very expensive to park an SUV on most streets. The vote came following a proposal by the mayor’s office as the city aims to cut air pollution and tackle the climate crisis.
https://www.bicycling.com/culture/a46651907/paris-closed-100-streets-to-cars-for-good/
Hoverbike
'It Felt Like Star Wars': Flying Hoverbike Makes Its US Debut
Posted by EditorDavid on Monday September 19, 2022 12:34AM
“Whirring as it powered up, a hoverbike lifted directly into the air in Michigan, video shows.”
That's the lead from one news report about a big debut at a U.S. auto show in Detroit: a gasoline-and-electric powered hoverbike (using a Kawasaki motor) created by Japanese manufacturing company AERWINS Technologies. They've already started selling them in Japan, and they're now also hoping to sell a smaller version in America in 2023. The hoverbike flies for 40 minutes, Reuters reports, and can reach speeds of up to 62 miles per hour (100 kph). (They added that the bike drew “perhaps inevitable comparisons to the speeder bikes of Star Wars.”)
Maintenance / Repair
Are Modern Bicycles the End of DIY Maintenance?
Bikes today perform better than ever, but many are too sophisticated for home mechanics. What’s being lost?
Joe Lindsey - Nov 1, 2022
Last spring, I finally dragged my Trek Checkpoint ALR5 out of the garage for a much-needed tuneup. I ride year-round, but it’s often difficult to regularly wash and tune a bike during winter in Colorado. The wear and tear from that neglect was mostly evident in the drivetrain, and after years of use, replacement was in order. Unfortunately, the Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 group that I wanted to install was already on another bike: a Factor Ostro VAM, which was the basis for this story on integration and uses a complicated, fully internal cable routing setup.
Getting the Dura-Ace parts from the Factor to the Trek would not be a simple task. It would involve buying at least $200 in tools and brushing off some rusty skills on hydraulic brake bleeds. And I needed to learn how—or even whether—the Di2 drivetrain’s electronic shift wire could be installed on the Checkpoint, which isn’t configured for full internal routing. The answer was obvious: Unless I wanted to make a substantial commitment of time and money, I would probably need a professional mechanic to do at least some of the work.
https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-gear/bikes-and-biking/modern-bicycles-the-end-of-diy-mechanic/
Tennis Balls Serve As Decent Bicycle Tires That Don’t Easily Puncture
Lewin Day - April 3, 2023
Pneumatic tires provide a great ride, great grip, and yet have one fatal flaw — they’re always getting punctured and leaving you stranded. [The Q] decided to solve this problem with a unique design: tires that use tennis balls as the cushioning medium instead.
The build begins with small cut sections of plastic water pipe. These are used as housings to hold tennis balls, which are pressed in with a unique tool of [The Q]’s own construction. The individual ball assemblies are then bolted into a standard bicycle wheel, and a tread from a regular bike tire is stretched around the outside for grip.
It goes without saying that these tires won’t offer the same quality of ride as regular pneumatic bike tires. Nor will the performance be as good, due to the significant extra unsprung weight. They are eye-catching and fun, however. Plus, if you live in an area with tons of nails or prickles, you might find these are just the ticket. Maybe.
A love letter to bicycle maintenance and repair
2022-02-06 - Tegowerk
It was the 28th of June, 2020; the perfect summer day. I remember it distinctly because of two important events that took place on that day. The first was the unfortunate discovery that I am highly sensitive to the venomous hairs of the Oak processionary caterpillar. If you’ve never wished you could use a cheese grater to remove the skin off your arms and legs just to be rid of the itching, then you can’t really understand how I felt for two whole weeks that summer.
The second thing that happened on that 28th of June was the seemingly inconsequential purchase of two secondhand bicycles. My wife and I drove out to a local park to test ride a couple of ’90s-era Trek 970 bikes that a guy had restored in his garage. We didn’t know a thing about bicycles, but we liked what we saw; the bikes worked great and felt very nice to ride around the park–the fact that I also happened to ride through a floating cloud of Oak-processionary hairs would only become apparent the next day.
Bike Manufacturers Are Making Bikes Less Repairable
Charlie Sorrel - October 14, 2024
The bicycle is probably the canonical example of something that anyone can fix. Spares from all brands are mostly interchangeable, and you can do most repairs with wrenches, screwdrivers, and Allen keys, or some fairly standard tools for bottom brackets and chainrings. But that’s all changing.
Just like cars, tractors, computers, and seemingly every other product category, bikes—and especially e-bikes—are going all black box on us. Instead of using standard parts that can easily be swapped or upgraded, bike makers are using more and more proprietary parts. At the same time, cheap bikes are getting worse and are designed to fail, or rather, they are not designed to last, which is pretty much the same thing.
https://www.ifixit.com/News/101675/bike-manufacturers-are-making-bikes-less-repairable
Theft
My bike was stolen
My bike is stolen, but I am able to get it back.
October 28th, 2017 - Zack “schollz”
On Wednesday, after work, in 2010, I went to get my bike to ride home. My brand new gray-and-red racing bike. It had bright red tires and red bar-tape. It looked and fast and it was fast. But, I glanced to where my bike should be and noticed my bike was gone. There was a piece of Velcro from my bike lock in the place my bike had been. Stolen, I thought. The Velcro could only come off if the bike lock had been cut. I called the police. They weren’t interested. Lots of bikes go missing and they are impossible to get back, they said.
I ran home. I got onto my computer. Maybe my bike would be on Craigslist? Probably not. I looked, and sure enough, I found my bike for sale on Craigslist! I called the police again and told them the good news. Unfortunately, they told me the bike is most certainly not mine and that it was not worth pursuing. I told them I had the original receipt for the bike with the serial number, and it would take only a second to compare it to the stolen bike. The police still were not interested. I went for another run to clear my mind, but I couldn’t stop thinking about how to get my bike back. I decided to act, on my own.
I went to Walmart and bought a burn phone.1 While I was in the checkout line I made some fake personas complete with backstories and email addresses - James Hannover and Mathew Phillipe. My backstory for James Hannover was a that he was a relatively new student to NCSU who works at a pizzeria and is interested in doing triathlons. For Mathew Phillipe the backstory was that he was a Durhamite who loved soccer and was looking to race his friend on Tobacco Road.
Meet the Tech-Savvy Sleuths Who Will Hunt Down Your Stolen Bike
If they can’t find it in two weeks, they’ll give you a new one—guaranteed.
Tom Vanderbilt and Photography by Parker Feierbach - Apr 14, 2022
One evening late last summer, the owner of a white 2019 VanMoof S2, which retails for upwards of $3,000, parked the bike at home, a Manhattan residence, locking it to a fence with a sturdy Abus lock. By 7:00 a.m. the next day, the bike was gone. Later that morning, the owner filed a police report, adding the bike to the thousands-strong roster of bicycles reported stolen every year in New York City—a list representing only about 20 percent of all bikes stolen there. Nearly all are never seen again by their owners.
Before notifying the police, however, the owner did something even more important: opened the VanMoof iPhone app and pressed a button marked “Report stolen.”
This set several events into motion. First, the bike switched to “stolen mode,” turning off the e-assist and any “smart” features. Second, the following day, the company activated its team of Bike Hunters—employees who are tasked with tracking down stolen VanMoofs.
https://www.bicycling.com/bikes-gear/a35429606/stolen-bicycle-theft-vanmoof-bike-hunters/
Where do stolen bikes go?
An experiment in Amsterdam reveals how pilfered bicycles are put to use.
Peter Dizikes | MIT News Office - February 15, 2023
Amsterdam is one of the most bike-friendly major cities in the world. That also means the city is a happy hunting ground for thieves, who steal tens of thousands of bikes per year — a substantial chunk of the estimated 850,000 or so that Amsterdam residents own. Which raises some questions. Where do all the stolen bikes go? Are they shipped elsewhere and sold? Tossed in canals? Or just reused in the city by other people?
Now an MIT experiment, in collaboration with the Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions, has found answers by equipping a fleet of Amsterdam bicycles with mobile trackers and following their whereabouts over time. It turns out that, at least in Amsterdam, the vast majority of stolen bikes remain in the local area. A substantial amount appear to get resold, meaning most simply keep circulating in the city’s bike fleet, one way or another.
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The 5 Best Online Communities and Websites for Cyclists
When you want to share your joy of cycling with this huge worldwide community, join one—or all—of these sites to connect with others.
Omega Fumba - 2 December 2022
road bike in motion Readers like you help support MUO. When you make a purchase using links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Read More.
Cycling is a great way to help you get into shape and take care of your overall health. Kick-starting your fitness journey can be challenging, especially if you’re starting an activity you’re unfamiliar with.
You might not know how to start and could feel lonely in your fitness journey through cycling. Luckily, you don’t have to be alone. Whether you need information to help you start or you simply want to join a community of experienced cyclists, there’s something online for you. Here, you’ll find five great websites and communities for cyclists.
https://www.makeuseof.com/best-online-communities-and-websites-for-cyclists/
Xuan
XUAN-Bike self-balancing, self-riding bicycle relies on flywheel, 22 TOPS Huawei Ascend A310 AI processor
Posted on July 14, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft)
After Huawei engineer Peng Zhihui Jun fell off this bicycle, he decided he should create a self-balancing, self-riding bicycle, and ultimately this gave birth to the XUAN-Bike, with XUAN standing for eXtremely, Unnatural Auto-Navigation, and also happening to be an old Chinese name for cars.
The bicycle relies on a flywheel and a control board with ESP32 and MPU6050 IMU for stabilization connected over a CAN bus to the motors, as well as Atlas 200 DK AI Developer Kit equipped with the 22 TOPS Huawei Ascend A310 AI processor consuming under 8W connected to a 3D depth camera and motor for self-riding.